Desire, Part 2
What does your hero want?
This is often the hardest question to answer for a writer who is just sitting down at a computer and staring at a blank screen.
Answering this question is tough because it’s so deceptively simple. Writers are itching to get complex and complicated and sophisticated, and so they resist endowing their hero with a single, simple desire. They’re afraid a hero with a single, simple desire will render their story a single, simple thing.
However, it’s amaaaaazing how a single, simple desire will save your butt as a writer.
It’s amaaaaazing how a single, simple desire is the very thing that allows for a complex and sophisticated story with a cast of characters and twelve settings and subplots galore. What holds all of that together for you and for the reader is the single, simple desire of your hero.
Your hero has the wingspan of a dreamer.
What does your hero want?
You must answer this question.
You must answer this question emphatically.
Your hero cannot sorta, kinda want something.
Your hero must really want this thing.
And believe me: I’m preaching to myself here. I’ve made this mistake. I’ve created a hero who was in denial about her true desire and thought she wanted this thing but really wanted that thing . . . but midway discovers she wants something else and tells other people that all along . . . but really she’s destined for . . . but then . . . and so . . . yeah. A total disaster.
Your hero has two main desires.
The Setup Desire
First, your hero has to want something that is achievable within the frame of the story. Your hero has to pursue a goal that will be achieved within the story, episode, movie, novel, or series. This desire is often called the setup desire because we learn about it right at the start (or setup) of your story.
The Life Dream
Second, your hero might have a life dream. That is, they might have a desire beyond the frame of the story. We may not find out whether or not your hero achieves this goal within the frame of the story.
For example, in my novel Locke Writes a Story to Save His Life, Locke wants to write a story because he wants to be a writer.
First, he wants to write the Monster Story in Mr. D.’s 8 LA class this school year. That’s Locke’s setup desire. The reader will find out whether or not Locke achieves this goal by the end of the novel.
Second, Locke wants to become a writer. This is his life dream, and his dream exceeds the timeline of this novel. The dream is part of what drives Locke to write the Monster Story, and the reader appreciates what writing this one story actually means to Locke. Writing the monster story is one thing. Writing the monster story because it’s a test of your life’s dream is something far more significant.
Note how the life dream is a thing we can relate to while not also sharing it.
The reader or viewer does not have to want to be a writer to appreciate how badly Locke wants to be a writer.
Note how this is the case with most stories. You don’t have to want to be a boxer to appreciate how much boxing means to Rocky Balboa. You don’t have to want to be a drummer or ballet dancer to appreciate how much drumming means to the hero of Whiplash (2014) and dancing means to the hero of Black Swan (2010).
We don’t have to share the specific dream. However, we do appreciate the nature of the dream. Boxing, drumming, dancing: these are callings.
Callings are desires intrinsic to the hero’s very personality.
We all have dreams and passions. In many stories, the hero pursues a passion as if their very life depends on it. A hero identifies so strongly with a type of work that they are called to it, and if they cannot pursue it, they feel their spirit shrink, shrivel, and die.
Life is not worth living, for these heroes, unless they can follow their dreams.
In the movie Amadeus (1984), Mozart is driven by a love for music. It’s his calling. Mozart is willing to die for it. In the novel Perfume (1985), Grenouille is driven by a love of perfume. That’s his calling. Grenouille is willing to kill for it.
Not all stories about about a hero’s calling, of course.
In monster stories (Jaws, Alien, The Quiet Place), the hero wants to survive, which is a primal desire we share, but there’s always another level of meaning to that hero’s survival, such as saving others, saving your family, saving the city, or saving the planet.
That other meaning is what allows us to be pulled into a hero’s mission to achieve the goal of their desire. They might be looking for dignity, respect, power, status, purpose, justice, or love.
In Just Mercy (book 2014, movie 2019), Bryan Stevenson wants justice. You don’t have to be a superhero lawyer to understand the drive for justice. And you don’t have to be an eleven-year-old orphan boy to understand the thrill of magic in Harry Potter. Magic is a way for kids (well, anyone) to imagine a world in which they have power.
In High Noon (1952), the marshal delays his wedding to defend his town. He wants to start a new life. To do that, he has to stop the bad guy out to get him.
All stories might just be love stories, in a sense.
We love ourselves, our work, our family, our friends, our tribe, our people, our city, our country.
Asking what your hero wants may be another way of asking what your hero loves.
In The Pursuit of Happyness (2006), for one example, the hero Chris Gardner endures all manner of humiliation as he struggles to land a paying job. He may have a calling to work in finance, but we don’t have to share his love of finance. What we identify with is the love he has for his son. Gardner walks through fire for his son, and we get that.
And if you’ve seen The Pursuit of Happyness, and you read the above paragraph, and the movie came rushing back to you, and you felt a lump in your throat . . . well, there you go. That’s your empathy talking. That’s the way human beings identify with each other. We feel as if we were in the place of another, and writers can connect their audience to their hero when they endow their heroes with desires we understand and loves we share.
So the setup desire can be related to your hero’s life dream. Your hero’s life dream is what gives meaning to the hero’s setup desire.
The life dream is a way of raising the stakes of the story. It’s not just about General Maximus in Gladiator (2000) killing the bad guy. Killing the bad guy is about General Maximus giving meaning to his entire life as a soldier by saving Rome . . . and thereby allowing him to finally reunite with his family in the afterlife.
So as you’re starting out developing your story, keep in mind that a hero’s single, simple desire is precisely what will enable you to write a full, strong, developed story.
What does your hero want?
What is your hero’s setup desire within the story?
What is your hero’s life dream beyond the story?
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PHOTO: The author in San Francisco a decade ago
